📣 News Having trouble finding CDs or Vinyl?

Rudy

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Many retailers large and small have been reporting difficulty in getting stock of CD and vinyl for their stores. It turns out there is a new distributor in place, Direct Shot Distributing, and it has become a bothersome bottleneck for both retailers and their customers. This includes products from small indie labels as well as the majors. When a chain like Newbury Comics can't get 600 copies of Led Zeppelin IV, or retailers in December can't even get their hands on a popular titles such as Vince Guaraldi's Charlie Brown Christmas, you know things are in a serious mess.

Just a heads-up in case you haven't been able to find product in stores lately.

The article is here, but behind a paywall:

'It's a Total Nightmare': Problems at Direct Shot Distributing Have Made New Vinyl and CDs Scarce
 
That's exactly it. The Billboard article had more details in it, but it's the same problem with Direct Shot Distributing.

I don't really care what happens to the major labels (they created the mess by depending on a poor, understaffed fulfillment company), but all of the indie record stores, labels and artists are hurting from the actions of this company. And it seems like the majors are only just now realizing that it's a major problem. Either that, or because streaming/downloading is now so popular, they are putting little effort into distributing physical product.
 
The Billboard article is behind a paywall... hopefully I can see it in the Billboard Bulletin which I get in my email.
 
The Billboard article is behind a paywall... hopefully I can see it in the Billboard Bulletin which I get in my email.
It's worth a read if you can get access to it. I was able to read it through the news feed on my phone, but I was not able to pull it up again through the history.
 
None of this surprises me one bit at all I kind of saw this coming at least a decade or two ago I'm surprised it hasn't happened sooner
 
It was indeed in the Bulletin. What a mess.

Given the way things are going these days I'm glad to be out of the music biz.
 
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